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Discovery (20969097681) - Public domain book illustration

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Discovery (20969097681) - Public domain book illustration

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Title: Discovery
Identifier: discovery0304londuoft (find matches)
Year: [1] (s)
Authors:
Subjects: Science
Publisher: London (etc. ) Professional and Industrial Pub. Co. (etc. )
Contributing Library: Gerstein - University of Toronto
Digitizing Sponsor: University of Toronto



Text Appearing Before Image:
DISCOVERY 205 remains actually found, but from the representation of such animals carved in two of the rooms of the temple. The bulls and the pig have already been mentioned ; the other animals are carved on two slabs which formed a kind of dado in a side chapel. One of these friezes represents two rows of eleven goats each. The animals, depicted as in motion, are well drawn and carefully modelled ; they have long curved horns with a back- ward sweep characteristic of the Persian wild goat. The other frieze shows four goats, a pig and a ram. important objects discovered, for they show, as no other object would, the high ideal of human nature entertained in the very dawn of civilisation. The potsherds collected among the Neolithic material are so numerous as to baffle description. There are fragments of pots of every shape and size, rough and polished, plain and decorated, coarse and thin. The majority of the vases display superior workmanship, being gracefully modelled, with a hand-burnished surface in some cases possessing the appearance of enamel. The colour varies from a light fawn to a
Text Appearing After Image:
Fig. 4.—bronze-age objects focxd in cinerary urns, hai. tarxien. The foregoing are the main features of the Tarxien temples which have added valuable information to what we already knew about the conditions of life during the Neolithic Age in Malta. The objects discovered in the ruins are hardly less important than the buildings themselves. As one would have expected, stone objects were the more numerous, and included such implements as hammers, mortars, grinders, troughs, and such objects as stone balls, cones of various descrip- tions, the use of which is not certain, polished stone axes, used probably as amulets, flint and obsidian knives, beads made from marine shells, bone awls, needles, burnishers, etc., all of which were encoun- tered in considerable quantity. Stone statuettes representing human figures are, perhaps, the most rich brown or a deep black. The plain polished ware is the more common, but decorated pottery was abun- dant. Fine lines and deep incisions, often filled up with a white or a red paste, decorated the polished surfaces with geometrical patterns ; a peculiar black ware is studded with circular bosses, forming sometimes elaborate scroll patterns, which stand out sharply on a white background. Painted ware has also been found, broad bands of a bright red colour being, in these cases, laid thickly along curved lines. All these objects point to the long experience of an old race which had lived for a considerable period under peaceful and favourable conditions. From informa- tion gained from all the Neolithic stations so far excavated, it appears that the Maltese settlers of the

Bone carving encompasses the acts of creating art, tools, and other goods by carving animal bones, antlers, and horns. It can result in the ornamentation of a bone or the creation of a distinct object. Bone carving has been practiced by a variety of world cultures, sometimes as a cheaper, and recently a legal, substitute for ivory carving. It was important in prehistoric art, with notable figures like the Swimming Reindeer, made of antler, and many of the Venus figurines.

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1825
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University of Toronto
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public domain

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archaeological objects from the tarxien temples
archaeological objects from the tarxien temples